Julian Assange to Host Russian TV Show

Julian Assange, the controversial founder of whistle-blower website WikiLeaks, has requested political asylum in Ecuador and is in its London embassy, officials of the South American nation stated Tuesday.

Embattled Wikileaks founder, Julian Assange, will be hosting a series of in-depth television interviews with key political players, thinkers and revolutionaries from around the world, according to his press release on Monday.

The program is expected to be telecast on RT, an English-language satellite television channel funded by the Russian state. The channel covers international events from their Moscow and Washington-based studios. Incidentally, RT has been accused by media analysts of a strong pro-Kremlin bias in its coverage, a BBC report said.

Meanwhile, Assange is famously the subject of an ongoing grand jury investigation in the U.S., in addition to fending off Swedish authorities looking to extradite him on charges of raping one woman and "sexually molesting and coercing" another in Stockholm, in August 2010.

"Through this series I will explore the possibilities for our future in conversations with those who are shaping it. Are we heading towards utopia or dystopia and how we can set our paths?" read Assange's press release.

"This is an exciting opportunity to discuss the vision of my guests in a new style of show that examines their philosophies and struggles in a deeper and clearer way than has been done before," he added.

The reports of Assange hosting the RT show were greeted on Twitter with a mixture of disbelief and anger.

The press release says the series will begin airing in mid-March, over ten weekly half-hour episodes. Initial licensing commitments cover over 600 million viewers across cable, satellite and terrestrial broadcast networks.